Ralph Compton Texas Hills

Book 0: A Ralph Compton Western

by David Robbins, Ralph Compton

Genres: General Fiction; Action & Adventure; Historical Fiction; Westerns

Synopsis

A family man takes embarks on a dangerous endeavor in this gripping Ralph Compton western.

Owen Burnett’s needs are small. All he’s ever wanted is his wife’s affection, his children’s health, and a little plot of land which he can farm. Still, he’s no fool. So when his neighbor Gareth Kurst makes him a business proposition, one that could leave him richer than he’s ever dreamed, he can’t refuse giving the risky scheme a try.

Rounding up cattle up in the Texas Hill Country is nothing to take on lightly. Between the Comanches roaming the countryside and the horns of the beasts he’s hunting down, Owen knows every second he spends out in the wild puts his life in plenty of danger. But the greatest threat to his person is one he never expected—his ruthless and conniving business partner, who has no plans of ever sharing his hard-earned cash....

Release date: November 3, 2015

Publisher: Berkley

Print pages: 304

Sample

 

“Ma!” Mandy whispered. “Look!” And she pointed.

THE IMMORTAL COWBOY

This is respectfully dedicated to the “American Cowboy.” His was the saga sparked by the turmoil that followed the Civil War, and the passing of more than a century has by no means diminished the flame.

True, the old days and the old ways are but treasured memories, and the old trails have grown dim with the ravages of time, but the spirit of the cowboy lives on.

In my travels—to Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska, Colorado, Wyoming, New Mexico, and Arizona—I always find something that reminds me of the Old West. While I am walking these plains and mountains for the first time, there is this feeling that a part of me is eternal, that I have known these old trails before. I believe it is the undying spirit of the frontier calling me, through the mind’s eye, to step back into time. What is the appeal of the Old West of the American frontier?

It has been epitomized by some as the dark and bloody period in American history. Its heroes—Crockett, Bowie, Hickok, Earp—have been reviled and criticized. Yet the Old West lives on, larger than life.

It has become a symbol of freedom, when there was always another mountain to climb and another river to cross; when a dispute between two men was settled not with expensive lawyers, but with fists, knives, or guns. Barbaric? Maybe. But some things never change. When the cowboy rode into the pages of American history, he left behind a legacy that lives within the hearts of us all.

—Ralph Compton

Chapter 1

A beanpole with hair the color of ripe corn ambled into the Crooked Wheel Saloon in Kerrville early on Saturday night. His high-crowned hat, his clothes, and his jangling spurs told everyone what he did for a living. Cowhands were as common as horses in some parts of Texas.

Smiling, the stranger jangled to the bar, paid for a drink, and brought it over to the table where Owen Burnett, Gareth Kurst, and Jasper Weaver were playing poker. Once every month or so, the three settlers came down out of the hill country to indulge in a few drinks and a sociable game of cards.

Owen Burnett came up with the idea. He’d thought it would be nice to get better acquainted. They were neighbors, after all. So what if they lived ten miles apart, or more? In the West, “neighbors” didn’t mean the same thing it did back east.

Owen was from Kentucky. He wasn’t all that big, but he was solid. He had short, sandy hair, a rugged complexion, and pale blue eyes. When the cowboy came to their table and asked if he could sit in, Owen smiled and gestured at an empty chair. “Help yourself, mister.”

Jasper Weaver grinned like a cat about to pounce on a sparrow. “If you won’t mind us taking your money,” he remarked. Which was a funny thing for Jasper to say given that he was the poorest card player west of the Mississippi River. Everyone thereabouts knew it. So did he, but Jasper never let it discourage him from playing. He was lean and gangly, with a face like a ferret’s and a neck like a buzzard’s. His brown hair stuck out from under his hat like so many porcupine quills.

Gareth Kurst grunted and eyed the cowboy with suspicion. He and most of his sons had the same features: black hair, blunt jaws, and eyes like shiny pieces of coal. “Why’d you pick our table, boy?”

About to set his drink down, the cowboy scowled. “First off, I’m not no infant. I’m eighteen, I’ll have you know. And second, you three looked friendly, although I might have been wrong about that.”

“We’re friendly,” Owen said.

“Speak for yourself,” Gareth said. “I never trust anybody until they prove they deserve it.”

“It’s not as if I’m out to rob you,” the cowboy said.

“You couldn’t if you tried,” Gareth said. “I give a holler, and three of my brood will be on you like hawks on a prairie dog.” He nodded at three of his sons over at the bar.

“What’s all this talk of robbing?” Jasper said. “We’re here to play cards.”

“Me, too,” the cowboy said. He took a sip and sighed with contentment. “They call me Shoe, by the way.”

“Peculiar handle,” Jasper said.

“Not really,” Shoe said. “I got hit by a horseshoe back when I was a sprout, and everyone took to calling me Horseshoe. Later that became just Shoe.”

“I should reckon you’d want to use your real name,” Jasper said.

“My folks named me Abimelech Ezekiel Moses. All three are from the Bible.”

“Maybe not, then,” Jasper said.

“Are we here to jabber or play?” Gareth Kurst said.

“You’re awful cantankerous tonight,” Owen said. He was in the process of shuffling the deck. “We’ll deal you in, Shoe. Jacks or better to open. The limit is ten cents.”

“That much, huh?” Shoe said.

“Ain’t none of us rich,” Jasper said.

Taking another swallow, Shoe offhandedly said, “You could be if you wanted to bad enough. Most anyone can these days.”

Jasper chuckled. “How does that work, exactly? We wish for money and it falls into our laps?”

Gareth uttered a rare laugh.

Pushing his hat back on his head, Shoe said, “Any of you gents know where to find longhorns?”

Owen nodded. “The hill country is crawling with them.” It was a rare day when he didn’t spot some off in the brush as he went about turning his homestead into what he hoped would become a prosperous farm.

“There you go,” Shoe said.

“You’re talking nonsense,” Gareth said.

Shoe looked at each of them. “You haven’t heard, then? How valuable they’ve become?”

“Longhorns?” Jasper said, and cackled.

Owen couldn’t help joining in. The notion was plumb ridiculous. Longhorns had been around since the days when Texas belonged to Spain. Left on their own in the wild, they’d bred like rabbits. To a lot of people, they were a nuisance more than anything. They were good to eat but not much else.

“We don’t like being ribbed,” Gareth said.

“Ribbed, hell,” Shoe said indignantly. “You’re behind the times. Cattle drives will be the next big thing. Everybody thinks so.”

Owen thought he knew what Shoe meant. “You mean those gents who took some longhorns up to Missouri to sell?”

“And now can’t anymore because the folks in Missouri are worried about diseases the longhorns might carry,” Jasper said.

“That’s a lot of trouble to go to for nothing,” Gareth said.

Jasper bobbed his chin. “Rounding up a bunch of contrary longhorns can’t be easy. And for what? Four dollars a head, if that?”

Shoe sat back. “Shows how much you know. How about if you sold them for ten times that much?”

“Forty dollars a head?” Jasper said in astonishment.

“That’s right,” Shoe said. “And not in Missouri, either. You’d take them to Kansas. The people back east are so beef-hungry, they’ll pay anything to have steak on their table.”

“You’re making this up,” Gareth said.

“As God is my witness,” Shoe said. “I left the ranch where I’ve been working to sign up with an outfit planning a drive.” He chuckled. “I can’t believe you haven’t heard about it. Last year a fella named Wheeler took the first herd up to Abilene. They say he made over ninety thousand dollars.”

Jasper’s jaw fell, Gareth’s coal eyes glittered, and Owen set down the deck he was about to deal. “You’re not joshing us?”

“As God is my witness,” Shoe said again.

“If that’s true,” Gareth said, “why aren’t you out rounding up a herd of your own?”

“By my lonesome?” Shoe said. “Might be I could collect a couple of dozen head, sure, but where would I keep them until I start the drive? I don’t own any land. The smart thing for me is to join a drive going north and learn how it’s done.” He grinned. “Besides, the pay is better.”

“Ninety thousand dollars,” Jasper said, and whistled. “Think of what a man could do with a fortune like that.”

“I’m thinking,” Gareth said.

“Sounds like too much risk for my taste,” Owen said. “Longhorns aren’t kittens.”

“It’s not too much risk for me,” Gareth said.

“I bet my missus would like me to,” Jasper said.

“You can’t be serious.” Owen couldn’t begin to imagine the work involved. And then there was all the time they’d be away from their families. The cowboy drained his glass and grinned. “Looks as if I’ve started something here.”

“You sure as blazes have,” Gareth said.

Chapter 2

Harland Kurst took after his ma more than his pa. Tell him that, and he’d wallop you. Harland’s pa was tall and muscular, his ma as broad as a barn door. Harland was tall and bulky. Truth was, he liked being big. He liked throwing his weight around and squashing anyone who made him mad.

Harland was the oldest of the five Kurst boys. On this particular night, he and the second oldest, Thaxter, had gone into town with their pa and their brothers but parted company to go to a different saloon. Harland told his pa he hankered to see a dove, but he really just wanted the freedom to do as he pleased.

His pa had a habit of reining Harland in when Harland didn’t want to be reined in.

Once Harland had enough whiskey in him, he liked to pick fights. Because he was so big, he nearly always got the upper hand. And he made sure to have Thaxter close by to back his play in case the person Harland picked on resorted to a six-gun. Thaxter was quick on the shoot. So much so, folks fought shy of him.

The Kurst Terrors, people called them behind their backs. Which tickled Harland to no end.

So now, while their pa was off playing cards at the Crooked Wheel, Harland leaned on the bar at the Brass Spittoon. The Spittoon wasn’t much as saloons went: a bar, tables, and a roulette wheel. The doves were dumpy and not all that friendly. Not to Harland, anyway. He liked it there anyhow.

“I see how you’re looking around, big brother,” Thaxter said after taking a swallow of bug juice. “You’re in one of your moods.”

“I’m always in a mood,” Harland said.

“Who will it be tonight? That gambler yonder? Him with that frilly shirt and those big buttons on his vest?”

For reasons Harland had never understood, Thaxter was always critical of others’ clothes. Harland didn’t give a damn what people wore. Thaxter, though, took it as an affront if he saw clothes he didn’t like. “Gamblers usually have hideouts up their sleeves.”

“So?” Thaxter patted the Colt he wore high on his hip.

“We don’t want you shooting anybody. The marshal won’t take kindly to that.”

“So?” Thaxter said again.

Harland chuckled. He wouldn’t put it past his brother to gun the lawdog, should it come to that. But then they’d be on the run. “I don’t aim to spend the rest of my days dodging tin stars.”

“Wouldn’t bother me any.”

Just then the owner of the saloon, Rufus Calloway, came down the bar, wearing his apron. “You boys need a refill?”

“When we do, you’ll know it,” Harland said.

Rufus was well into his middle years and had a balding pate and bulging belly. “I don’t like the sound of that. No trouble tonight, Harland, you hear me?”

“Or what? You’ll hit me with your towel?”

Thaxter laughed.

“I mean it, boys,” Rufus said. “I can’t have you causing trouble all the time. It scares the customers off.”

“Oh, hell,” Harland said. “It’s not as if I ever really hurt anybody.”

“My brother does as he pleases,” Thaxter said.

“Your pa won’t like it if you do,” Rufus told them.

Bending toward him, Harland growled, “Anyone tells him, they better light out for the hills.”

Rufus swallowed and made a show of running his towel over the counter. “Just behave, is all I ask.”

“Behaving ain’t fun,” Harland said.

“Go bother somebody else,” Thaxter said.

Rufus went.

“I swear,” Thaxter said in derision. “He’s got as much backbone as a bowl of butter.”

Harland thought that was funny. He tilted his glass to his lips, then narrowed his dark eyes as someone new came strolling in. “Well, lookee there. What is it the parson is always saying? Ask and you’ll get what you want.”

The newcomer was about their age and wore city clothes: a bowler, a suit, polished boots, but no spurs. He had a ruddy complexion and red hair, and smiled at everybody.

“It’s Mr. Perfect,” Thaxter said.

“He sure thinks he is,” Harland said. Nudging Thaxter, he drained his glass, set it down, and moved toward where the man in the bowler was joshing with several men at a card table. Coming up behind him, Harland said, “As I live and breathe. If it isn’t Timothy Pattimore.”

Pattimore turned, his smile becoming a frown. “Hell in a basket. Leave me alone, you two.”

“Is that any way to talk to a good friend?” Harland said, and wrapped his arm around the smaller man’s shoulders.

“We are anything but,” Pattimore said. “Get it over with. Knock my hat off. Call me a dandy. Have your brother make me dance with his six-shooter. I won’t raise a hand against you. I learned my lesson the last two times.”

“Well, listen to you,” Harland said. “You’re no fun.”

An older man at the table said, “Leave him be, you Kursts. You’re always stirring up trouble.”

“Who asked you, you old goat?” Thaxter said.

Another player chimed in with, “You hill folk. Always riding in here like you own the place. This town has grown up. Your sort of antics aren’t welcome anymore.”

“I should pistol-whip you,” Thaxter said.

Harland saw that others were giving them looks of disapproval. He was used to that. The weak always resented the strong.

“There’s something you should know, though,” Timothy Pattimore said. “The marshal is right across the street, having a smoke. You start a ruckus and he’ll be in here before you can blink.”

“Have a look,” Harland said to his brother.

Thaxter stepped to the batwings and peered out. “There’s someone over by the general store smoking, all right. I can see the glow. Can’t tell who it is because of the dark.”

“It’s the marshal,” Pattimore insisted.

“I believe you,” Harland said. “You’re too much of a chicken to lie to us.” His mood suddenly evaporated. Removing his arm, he said, “To hell with all of you. This place has gone to the dogs.”

“We’re civilized now,” Pattimore said. “We have law and order. You Kursts should get used to it.”

“Your law only goes as far as the town limits,” Harland reminded him. Beyond lay hundreds of square miles of mostly uninhabited hill country, of wilderness as wild as anywhere. He strode toward the batwings. “Come on,” he said to Thaxter. “The air in here has gotten too righteous for my liking.” He pushed on out into the cool of the night and heard someone make a remark that simmered his blood.

“Those Kurst boys. Mark my words. They’re going to come to a bad end. Every last one of them.”

Chapter 3

Owen Burnett didn’t give much more thought to the cowboy and his news about the cattle drives. Sure, the notion held some appeal. So did prospecting for gold. But as anyone with any common sense was aware, few gold hounds ever struck it rich.

Owen didn’t deem it worth mentioning to his wife when he got home. He had land to clear, ground to till, daily chores to do. A farm didn’t run itself.

Owen liked being a farmer. He’d liked it in Kentucky, where they were from. He’d helped to work his pa’s farm in Caldwell County growing up, and when he struck out on his own, he continued doing what he liked best. He’d still be there if it hadn’t been for his wife.

Philomena shocked him one day by sitting him down in the parlor and informing him that she’d like to move. It came out of the blue. They’d been happy where they were, or so he thought. Granted, their farm was small, and with their two sons and two daughters, more land and a larger house would be nice.

Recovering from his surprise, Owen had suggested looking for a bigger farm right there in Kentucky. Philomena, though, had been studying up on the homestead law, and she’d taken it into her head that having the government give them one hundred and sixty acres would be just about the greatest thing in the world.

“It’s an opportunity we can’t pass up,” she’d said in that tone she used when she wouldn’t brook an argument.

Then she’d stunned Owen even more by saying that she had thought about it and thought about it, and she’d like for them to move to Texas.

In the past, Owen had been willing to go along with her notions. But Texas? It might as well be the moon. At least the moon didn’t have Comanches and other hostiles. And outlaws. Texas had a reputation for being wild and woolly that put other states to shame. He brought all that up, but Philomena refused to be swayed. Texas was a land of opportunity—there was that word again—where a hardworking family could prosper like nowhere else.

“If it was good enough for Davy Crockett and Jim Bowie, it’s good enough for us,” Philomena had concluded her pitch.

Owen hadn’t seen what that had to do with anything. Neither Crockett nor Bowie were farmers. And Philomena seemed to have forgotten that those men went off to Texas and had gotten themselves killed. Still, in her mind only Texas would do.

Now here they were nearly three years later at their new homestead, the work harder than it had ever been in Kentucky. They had a bigger, if plainer, house, built with their own hands, and had cleared about fifty of their one hundred and sixty acres.

Philomena picked the spot. She liked the hill country. It reminded her of Kentucky, what with the rolling hills, woods, and grass. And the soil was good for growing crops.

When they first settled there, they’d had their part of Creation all to themselves. Jasper Weaver and his family showed up about six months later. Jasper, his wife, Wilda, and their son, Reuben, lived farther back in the hills, practically hidden from the world.

Gareth Kurst and his large clan had only been there a year or so. Gareth chose a site on Wolf Creek, about ten miles from Owen. With his five grown sons to help, Gareth could easily have cleared his land and had a fine farm by now. But the Kursts weren’t farmers. They were hunters. They’d built a cabin barely big enough to contain them, and that was it.

Which was why what came next surprised Owen so much.

On a sunny spring morning, Owen was downing trees. He’d stripped to the waist and was wielding his axe with relish. He liked the exercise, liked the feel of working his muscles, liked the sweat it brought to his brow. With each stroke, the axe bit deep into the oak he was cutting down and sent chips flying. He was so engrossed in his work that he didn’t realize riders had come up until a horse nickered.

Stopping, Owen turned. He thought it might be one of his sons come to help, but it was Gareth Kurst and two of his own boys, Harland and Thaxter.

“Neighbor,” Owen said, nodding. “Don’t see you over this way much.” He mopped his forehead with his forearm.

“We need to talk,” Gareth announced. “I’ve been to Jasper’s and he agrees, so now I’m paying you a visit.”

“You make it sound serious,” Owen said.

“It’s life or death,” Gareth said.

Alarmed, Owen said, “Are the Comanches on the warpath?”

“No,” Gareth said. “I’m here to talk about that cow business.”

“Oh.” Owen smothered a snort of amusement. “That’s hardly life or death.”

“In a manner of speaking, it is.”

“How so?” Owen asked. He’d never cottoned to Gareth all that much. The man could be surly, and ruled his roost with an iron fist. When he told his brood to do something they jumped, or else. Philomena once confided in him that Gareth’s wife, Ariel, had confided in her that Gareth slapped her on occasion. Owen never could abide men who abused their womenfolk.

“Moneywise,” Gareth said.

Owen rested the handle of his axe across his shoulder. “The ninety thousand dollars got to you, did it?”

“Hell, twenty thousand is a fortune as far as I’m concerned,” Gareth said. “However much, it’s more than any of us would make in our entire lives.”

“What are you saying?”

“It should be as plain as the nose on your face,” Gareth said. “I’m proposing that you and me and Jasper go into the cattle business together and fill our pokes with more money than we ever imagined having.”

“God in heaven,” Owen blurted. He couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

“God,” Gareth Kurst said, “has nothing to do with this.”

Chapter 4

Philomena Burnett didn’t like some of the Kurst clan. Not from the moment she met them. Gareth Kurst was one of those men who looked down their noses at everyone female. Gareth’s boys—most of them, anyway—were ill-mannered. Gareth’s daughter was a flirt. And Gareth’s poor wife worked herself to death to please her man and keep her brood happy. Ariel, her name was, and she wasn’t much more than their servant.

Philomena could never live like that. She had too much pride. Too much gumption. And she wasn’t shy about giving someone sass if they imposed on her in ways they shouldn’t. Fortunately, her Owen was as considerate a man as was ever born. She loved him dearly, and the feeling was mutual.

When Owen showed up with Gareth and the two oldest Kurst boys, she picked up right away that this was more than a social visit. The men had something serious to talk about. They roosted at the table while she put coffee on the stove. They didn’t ask her to sit in but she could hear every word. And she didn’t like what she heard.

“Something like this doesn’t come along very often, if at all,” Gareth was saying. “It’s a godsend, dropped right into our laps.”

“I thought you said God doesn’t have anything to do with it,” Owen remarked.

“We’re in the right place at the right time,” Gareth said. “There are more longhorns in these hills than you can shake a stick at. Hell, in a month, I bet we could round up a couple of thousand.”

“I’ll thank you to watch your language around my wife,” Owen said.

Philomena grew warm inside, and not from the stove. She liked how he always insisted she be treated like a lady. It showed Owen respected her. Which was more than could be said about Gareth’s feelings for Ariel.

“And that seems a mite high,” Owen had gone on.

“Maybe, if only one family went about it. But not if all three of our families work together,” Gareth said. “We do it right, each of us stands to make twenty to thirty thousand dollars.”

Philomena couldn’t understand why they were talking about such large sums of money. Make thirty thousand dollars? Why, they should walk on air while they were at it. She wanted to take the coffee over and stand next to Owen, but when she touched the pot, it wasn’t hot enough.

“A third for each of us,” Gareth said.

“And all we have to do is round up two thousand longhorns and drive them, what, almost a thousand miles?”

“Only about seven hundred,” Gareth said. “I did some asking around in town and that’s how far a gent who has been there told me it was.”

“Still a long way,” Owen said, “and we’re not cattlemen.”

“How hard can it be? There’ll be more than enough of us. There’s me and my five boys and you and your two and Jasper and his son. That makes eleven. Plus Lorette wants to help, too, and she can ride as good as anyone.”

“It sounds too much like wishful thinking,” Owen said.

Gareth placed his elbows on the table. “Look. Let’s say we only round up a thousand head. That still comes to forty thousand dollars. Which is pretty near fourteen thousand for you, me, and Jasper. I don’t know about you, but to me, even fourteen thousand is a lot of money.”

Philomena was unable to contain her curiosity any longer. She left the stove and went over and stood beside Owen. Forcing a light laugh, she said, “The sums you’re throwing around. What’s this business about, anyhow?”

“If you’ve been listening, you should know,” Gareth said archly. “I’d like your man to join me and Jasper Weaver in a cattle drive to Kansas.”

“Word is,” Owen said when Philomena looked at him, “up there they’ll pay forty dollars a head.”

“For a longhorn?” Philomena found the notion amusing. Longhorns were big but they were spindly critters. All horns and legs, was how she thought of them. And they didn’t fetch more than four dollars a head in Texas.

“Cattle is cattle,” Gareth said. “And the brush is crawling with the critters, just waiting to be rounded up.”

“I can’t farm and go after longhorns, both,” Owen said. “I couldn’t grow the crops I need. My family would suffer.”

“Not much,” Gareth said. “Your root cellar is well stocked, you once told me. And it’ll be worth it once you have more money than you’ll know what to do with.”

“I don’t know,” Owen said.

Philomena was startled. She knew that tone. Her husband was considering the idea. “Owen?”

“It’s tempting, is all,” Owen said.

“It’s what anyone with half a brain would do,” Gareth said, and then gestured. “Not that I’m saying you don’t have one, Burnett. But a chance like this doesn’t come along but once in a man’s life, if then.”

“You’ve made your point,” Owen said.

“And?”

“I told you. I don’t know.”

“Jasper didn’t hesitate. He jumped right on it. Or, rather, his wife did and he jumped on right behind her.”

“I’m not Jasper. I have to talk it over with Philomena and ponder on it some.”

Gareth gave Philomena a glance that hinted he would be happy if she made herself scarce. She wasn’t about to. “Maybe I should sit in,” she suggested, “and we’ll hash this over right here and now.” She tactfully added, “So Mr. Kurst won’t have to wait days for our answer.”

“A good idea, woman,” Gareth said. “Beats me why he has to consult you, anyhow. A female needs to know her place. My Ariel, I tell her how things will be and she goes along.”

“Isn’t she lucky to have you for her husband?” Philomena said.

Chapter 5

Luke Burnett had snuck off to practice. His ma would have a fit if she knew. She was always on him about it. “Stop playing with that thing,” she’d say, and warn him, yet again, that no good would come of it.

The “thing” was a revolver.